Between Friends: A City Between Compliation by W.R. Gingell

Author:W.R. Gingell [Gingell, W.R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub

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I couldn’t see that Pet had any magic to her, but she pushed me up the road so energetically that it had to have been magic that kept her going uphill the whole way back to my flat. Neither of us looked too closely at the café as we passed; there was a blankness to the windows that was unpleasant, and I was glad that Pet kept us to the other side of the street.

“At least there’s another café down the road,” she said a little bit hopefully, as we approached my flat. “They do pretty good coffee, too.”

“I seem to have lost the appetite for coffee,” I said, gazing up at my flat. What a shame. I’d gotten so used to living here, and now I would have to find somewhere else. The goblins knew where to find me—worse, when Pet got back to them, Lord Sero would undoubtedly know, too. I was under no illusions that she wouldn’t tell them everything they asked. She was their pet, after all.

“Oh,” said Pet sadly, and I looked over my shoulder at her. “Does that mean I won’t see you anymore when I get coffee?”

I was tempted. For just a moment, I was very tempted. It was a long time since I’d seen a look like that from a woman, human or Behindkind. And she was such a nice little thing, too. It could be nice to get to know her little by little, over a cup of coffee, with a smile.

But there was too much hazard to my life to be sitting quietly for coffee and smiles—and if there was too much hazard in my life, there was an overabundance of it in Pet’s life. The kind of overabundance that spills over into the lives of those around them.

And then there was Lord Sero. I had seen the frown when he looked from myself to Pet, and it wasn’t the sort of frown I would have associated with mere fondness for a pet. I didn’t think it was a romantic interest, but it was certainly something. I could still feel that newness of zest to my life that I hadn’t felt in years, and I wasn’t prepared to end that at Lord Sero’s hands if I made a mistake with his Pet—nor was I prepared to end it at the teeth of a vampire, if it came to that.

“I’ll see you from time to time,” I said, even though I knew it was a lie as I said it. I would be gone just as soon as I could pack my things. “They’ll send you to ask me to do things.”

“They will, won’t they?” she agreed. “Athelas likes discovering new talents, and Zero loves using them. Don’t be too afraid of them, ’Zul. They look mean—yeah, well, they are mean—but they look after their own.”

“That will be more comforting when I feel that I am one of their own,” I said, though I had no intention of being on such terms with the Troika.

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